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UNITED NATIONS, June 17 (NNN-XINHUA) – A Chinese envoy asked the United States to immediately lift unilateral sanctions against Syria.

Years of economic blockade have caused tremendous hardships on the Syrian people, in particular women and children. The sufferings caused by the devaluation of the Syrian currency and soaring commodities prices, including food prices, fall heavily on civilians across the country, said Zhang Jun, China’s permanent representative to the United Nations.

UNITED NATIONS, June 16 (Xinhua) -- UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called for inter-Korean dialogue to defuse tension on the Korean Peninsula, said his press office on Tuesday.

"The secretary-general is concerned by the latest developments on the Korean Peninsula," said the press office in a note to correspondents, quoting an unnamed spokesman of Guterres. "The secretary-general calls for the resumption of inter-Korean dialogue leading to peaceful solutions that benefit peace and prosperity for all." 

UNITED NATIONS, June 16 (Xinhua) -- A Chinese envoy on Tuesday asked the United States to immediately lift unilateral sanctions against Syria.

Years of economic blockade have caused tremendous hardships to the Syrian people, in particular women and children. The sufferings caused by the devaluation of the Syrian currency and soaring commodities prices, including food prices, fall heavily on civilians across the country, said Zhang Jun, China's permanent representative to the United Nations.

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 16 (APP): The UN General Assembly is set to vote on Wednesday to elect five states to two-year terms on the Security Council, beginning on January 1, 2021.

Simultaneously, the 193-member Assembly will be electing new members of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), and the president of its 75th session, which begins in September.

The Security Council has five permanent members — the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France — and 10 nine-non-permanent members elected by the General Assembly, with five members elected every year.

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 16 (APP): UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has voiced deep concern over the continued use by the Indian security forces in occupied Jammu and Kashmir of torture and pellet guns against children as well as their illegal detentions, and called on New Delhi to “immediately end” such practices.

The call was made by Guterres in the annual report on Children and Armed Conflict, which was launched on Monday by his Special Representative on the subject, Virginia Gamba.

16 June 2020; MEMO: The United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organisation yesterday warned that more than 50,000 children under the age of five could die this year in the Middle East and North Africa region (MENA) due to the disruption in the health systems caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

16 June 2020; MEMO: UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has sparked outrage among campaigners over his decision yesterday to remove the Saudi-led coalition against Yemen from a UN blacklist, which had previously named and shamed the kingdom for killing and injuring children in the war-torn country.

NEW YORK, June 15 (Xinhua) -- The World Health Organization (WHO) remains "the world's best hope for fighting pandemics," a New York Times opinion piece has said, calling for more investment than less.

The article, titled "Don't Leave the WHO. Strengthen It" and released on Saturday, said that as the world is battling the most serious pandemic in a century, "the United States is in the process of withdrawing from the only international organization equipped to lead that effort."

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 15 (APP): UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called for “people everywhere” to support migrants as the World Bank projected that remittances will fall by about 20 percent due to the coronavirus-induced economic crisis.

Marking the International Day of Family Remittances, which will be observed tomorrow, the UN chief Guterres recognized the determination of the 200 million migrants who regularly send money home, and 800 million families, in communities throughout the developing world, who depend on those resources.

UNITED NATIONS, Jun 14 (APP): World Health Organization (WHO) has expressed concern about the impact of coronavirus on women, children and young people, as the pandemic continues to escalate.

“The indirect effects of COVID-19 on these groups may be greater than the number of deaths due to the virus itself”, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a virtual new briefing in Geneva.

The pandemic has overwhelmed health systems in many parts of the world, which means women may be at greater risk of dying from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth, WHO said.